She’s won multiple national, regional, and local awards for her reporting, and her work has aired on NPR and stations throughout the country. She’s particularly proud of the variety of protective clothing she’s had to wear on assignment, including helmets, waders, safety goggles, and snowshoes.

Originally from Chicago, IL, Gourlay loves music, cooking, and spending time with her family.

Ways To Connect

Citing data that shows an increase in children living in poverty, Gov. Gina Raimondo has reinstated the Children’s Cabinet. The group has not met for close to a decade. It’s charged with coordinating services for children across state agencies. One of the founders of the Children’s Cabinet, former Cranston senator Thomas Izzo, says reconvening the group sends a message that child welfare matters.

“If you don’t have forceful proponents and advocates within the legislature or policymakers," said Izzo, "kids’ issues get lost very quickly.”

Governor Gina Raimondo has asked a working group to come up with a way to slow health care spending in Rhode Island. It's a strategy that has showed promise in Massachusetts.

Raimondo signed an executive order to establish the Working Group for Health Care Innovation. The group’s charge is to propose a way to limit the growth in public and private health care spending. One model might be close to home. Raimondo says Massachusetts placed a cap on spending.

Governor Gina Raimondo recently announced the state would launch a new $5 million dollar tourism ad campaign. The ad agency hasn’t been chosen yet…but Rhode Island Public Radio decided...why wait? We asked you to come up with a new slogan for the Ocean State. Then we culled our three favorites, and asked you to pick the winner.

The results are in. The winning slogan, "The biggest moments are made in the smallest state," comes from Frankie B. Washington, a freelance illustrator living in Cranston.

The rising number of overdose deaths has strained the resources of the state’s only medical examiner’s office. Limited staffing and a growing number of requests have slowed down investigations – and threaten the office’s accreditation.

I first met Jim Gillen, who died over the weekend after a long battle with cancer, a couple of years ago. I was reporting on skyrocketing rates of opioid addiction and overdose. And if you wanted to know about addiction and recovery in Rhode Island, you sought out Jim.